August
by V.M. Bell
Summary: The Black sisters on a summer's day.


**August**

It was with a yawn that Narcissa found her attentions drawn away from the novel before her and towards the window. She was disappointed, though, to find the dark-patterned curtains still obscuring the view beyond, and then she remembered: London was stricken with the indolence of an unusually warm summer, and the Blacks' residence had fallen victim to it as well. Mother had ordered that none of the lights were to be turned on and all of the windows were to be appropriately shaded during the day. Indeed, she was quite insistent about her order and threatened to severely punish anyone who disobeyed it. Narcissa recalled crying on many on occasion when Mother lectured her, but she thought with a sudden upwelling of pride that she was eleven years old now, freshly released from her first year at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She was poised, mature, and utterly beyond mundane concerns -- there was no invective Mother could utter that would shake her.

Narcissa set her book down with a sigh and stood up. She strode towards the window and parted the curtains, which screeched violently in protest. Sunlight flooded the room, and she averted her eyes as they adjusted to the sudden brightness. Within a few moments, though, she could lean her elbows upon the window ledge, rest her chin against her clasped hands, and watch the world. The heat, it seemed, did not stop the neighboring Muggle children from venturing into the street with their kites and bicycles. She smiled, hearing them yell and scream, and pitied their existences. Wondering if Mother would pardon her if she violated the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery just this once, she was tempted to pull her wand out of her trunk and show these children a bit of _real_ magic -- but, realizing that she was already breaking one rule by simply looking outside, she decided it would be best to remain as she was.

A few minutes passed before she noted that the Muggles did not wander near the far end of the street. Narcissa tilted her head and squinted towards the distance. There was something black lying on the road, and in spite of herself, her curiosity was piqued. She pulled the curtains shut, and after checking for spying family members, she dashed out the front door.

As a thin ribbon of sweat formed on her forehead, she thought that Mother hadn't lied when she claimed that it was too hot to live. Although that end of the street was only a minute's walk away, Narcissa berated herself for being so stupid and thoughtless. Would it have taken so long to put on a hat? The sun, she was sure, would ruin her lovely skin and complexion, and perhaps the Slytherin boys would no longer compliment her. Oh, of all things, she would not be able to bear that one!

Thus, Narcissa's interest, already fading, disappeared entirely in a rush of disappointment when she at last realized what the mysterious object was. It's a bird, she thought, and the thought was lost to the heat. Then, turning around without another look, she went back home.

--

One hour later, Narcissa wondered into the kitchen in search of water. The living room was quite a stuffy place to be, and she was afraid that she might swoon if she did not quickly find something to drink. What she did not expect to find, however, were the windows propped open and her sister slumped against the table, her dress pulled up to her thighs.

"Andromeda!" Narcissa exclaimed, gaping.

The dark-haired girl gave a little twitch and sat up. "Narcissa, is that you? Oh, Merlin, it's hot."

"Andromeda, what are you doing here, and why are the windows open?" she said very quickly as she bustled around the room, picking up a spare glass tumbler that had been resting on the counter.

"Well, from the looks of it, I was sleeping because there is nothing else to do. And the windows are open because it's hot -- haven't I told you that already?"

"But Mother -- "

"I don't give a damn what Mother thinks."

The glass slipped from Narcissa's hand and splintered against the floor. "You shouldn't say those things," she whispered, her eyes widening.

"Oh, Narcissa, do grow up a bit, will you? I am feeling unbearably hot; therefore, the only logical thing to do is to let in some air." Narcissa scowled at the exasperation of her older sister. "The curtains only make it worse, you know."

"_I've_ been sitting in the living room and it isn't hot at all. But it's very hot outside. I went outside, you know," she added with a nod.

"Why did you go outside? I'm sure dear Mother wouldn't have let you."

"Well, there was something on the road, and I wanted to look at it," she said, making a face. "It was a dead bird. It was black and ugly, but maybe it was still alive. I don't think it is. It was very boring, so I came back right away."

"Oh?"

Narcissa scowled again and returned to her quest to find a cup of water. Tiptoeing around the shattered glass, she approached the cabinet, but the knob was out of her reach.

"Here, let me help."

Andromeda stood up and straightened her skirts, which were wrinkled with sweat. Narcissa's eyes scanned the whole of her sister's height -- Andromeda would be a fourth year in the fall, and she certainly looked the part. She had grown many inches since the last summer, and her entire figure was more defined, more feminine. She watched Andromeda reach upward for a glass and bring it to the sink, where she turned the faucet on. Narcissa was entranced: every one of her sister's movements seemed impeccably planned and executed.

Andromeda handed her the glass, and Narcissa downed its contents faster than was likely polite. When she set the glass down, Andromeda was still standing.

"Is something wrong?" Narcissa asked.

"No, nothing…but I was wondering, did you say where this bird was?"

"Oh, that. It's somewhere on that side of the road." Narcissa tilted her head to the right. Andromeda nodded. "Why?"

"I want to take a look at it."

Narcissa wrinkled her nose. "But it's…"

"It's something to do -- an adventure, really."

Andromeda smiled at her as she left the kitchen. Narcissa remained, wondering why her sister couldn't have poured her more water.

--

Never trust an eleven year old girl with a penchant for melodrama, Andromeda thought as she alighted from the front doorstep and into the street. Yes, it was quite hot, but how _free_ it was to leave the confines of her house and to feel the breeze -- for there was a breeze, if only a slight one -- running through her hair. Leaving the windows open would no longer suffice. If she were going to break a rule, she might as well spend her days out here instead. It was better than suffocating while indoors, in any event. Strolling down the street, she watched the children at play, acknowledging, just for a moment, that perhaps these Muggles had some sense to them after all.

Suddenly, she heard a loud shout from behind her, and something very hard and painful hit her in the back. Biting her lip as she massaged her spine, she turned around only to find a sullen-looking little boy standing some distance away and, behind him, a host of little boys all looking at anything but her. At her feet rested a football, and Andromeda grinned. It was a just a little game gone awry -- not much to be troubled about. She took a few steps backwards, then ran and kicked the ball with as much strength as she could muster, and the boys chased after it, resuming their raucous sport without a second thought. Still smiling, Andromeda wiped her hands on her dress and continued in her original direction.

From a distance, she had already spotted the bird. As she neared it, however, she noticed something: _it wasn't dead_. On the contrary, it was unambiguously alive -- alive and struggling. Andromeda slowed her pace: it would be best, she reasoned, to approach it with caution and to give it the distance it required. Perhaps it, like herself, had just been resting and was now readying to leave. Perhaps it did not require her help, but she had to know.

It was sprawled on the pavement, its body writhing as it worked to right itself. The problem lay in the wings -- one of them, in particular. Cocked at a curious angle, she realized with a start that it was broken. A bird without properly function wings was hardly a bird at all. It would die here, she thought with a shudder. Maybe it would be run over by one of those Muggle contraptions called cars, or maybe it would waste away, diminishing as the summer stole its livelihood, and just…_die_.

The notion that a living being -- with a heart, with lungs, with breath and blood -- could simply perish chilled Andromeda as few things ever had; that she could do no more than watch this poor creature pained her greatly. She thought of mending its bones with magic, but given her current status as an underage wizard, she knew that to be a very unwise course of action. She could pick it up, somehow, and take it to a Muggle animal doctor -- surely a trained professional like that would know how to deal with an injury like this -- but the bird was not helpless, not yet. Life still held sway over it, and truthfully, she was a little frightened of its flailing. She herself could get hurt, trying to touch it.

Compassion had its limits, yet she could not allow the bird to suffer alone.

--

It was the third time this month that Andromeda had promised to meet her for an outing to Diagon Alley and failed to show up at her room at the appointed time, and Bellatrix could tolerate only so much of this. She stormed through the house, calling for her sister but receiving no response. Finally, she shoved her way into the kitchen, and finding someone standing beneath the cabinets, she exclaimed, "_There _you are, Andy."

"I'm not Andromeda," the figure said, and Bellatrix blinked.

"Oh, Cissy, it's only you."

"Can you help me, Bella?" Narcissa turned around and held out an empty glass. "I can't reach the sink."

Bellatrix walked to her side and frowned. "I told you to stop calling me that."

"But you always call me 'Cissy,' and I don't like that. That's why I call you 'Bella.' "

"I'm older than you, _Cissy_." She smirked as her youngest sister glowered, but she took the glass from Narcissa all the same, refilled it, and handed it back to her. The little girl drank greedily. "I can call you whatever I'd like."

"Can I have more water, please?"

"Learn to get it yourself. I'm looking for Andy."

"Andromeda left."

Bellatrix paused, then quirked an eyebrow. "What do you mean, she left?"

"Andromeda was in the kitchen, but then I told her about a bird and she went to go find it."

"I didn't realize Andy liked birds."

"She said she wanted an adventure."

"So, where is this bird?"

Narcissa tilted her head to the right. "On the end of the street -- on that side."

"Do you know if she's still there?" Narcissa shrugged, and Bellatrix laughed, motioning towards the kitchen's exit. "Well, Cissy, you're not much help at all, are you? I suppose I'll have to find our elusive sister myself."

"I'm really thirsty!" she cried as Bellatrix close the door behind her.

--

What an awful bore the summer had become, and how much it was aggravated by her parents' continual nagging about N.E.W.T.s! She wouldn't be sitting the exams until late in her seventh year, and yet, before she could even begin her sixth year, they were already reminding her to brush up on her potions (clearly your weakest area, dear, Mother would intone over supper) or to begin memorizing not-yet-taught incantations. Their concern for her future marks, always rather overbearing, had begun to feel even more oppressive as of late, and she was sick of it all. Though both of her parents had done very well at Hogwarts and her two sisters showed academic promise as well, Bellatrix simply wasn't _interested_ in school anymore.

Her talents, she had realized over the past few years, were better applied elsewhere, and oh, Bellatrix knew she had talent. Magic was a much more potent force when learned without the explicit aid of another. Learning spells on her own time had forced her to understand every one of them intimately and to shape them around her own powers, making them more powerful than they otherwise would have been. Magic was inherently endowed with greater aims, she believed, than mere grades. There was a very good reason why most people in this world were not worthy of it, she thought smugly as she passed the Muggles lost in their own diversions, and one day, they would come to understand that.

Meanwhile, she had to find Andromeda so that they could set off for Diagon Alley as soon as possible. Bellatrix, of course, had no liking for her sister's friends -- they were of the very wishy-washy and useless type, and she harbored a suspicion that some of them had pro-Muggle sympathies or that some of them were not even Slytherins -- but they were a convenient excuse. Mother, protective and naïve as ever, highly approved of Bellatrix when she offered to chaperone dear little Andromeda's trips to Diagon Alley without ever realizing that her eldest daughter had an ulterior motive. Andromeda, of course, was under no illusion as to what Bellatrix did while in Diagon Alley (chaperoning certainly was not part of it), but they were sisters. Bellatrix had never even said a word about it, and Andromeda had tacitly consented to silence.

It was, in Bellatrix's view, a perfect arrangement.

--

As matters turned out, Andromeda had not wandered very far away at all. Bellatrix saw her from some distance away and jogged towards her, yelling, "Andy!"

When her sister did not respond, she tried again. "Andy! Oh, for Merlin's sake, Andy, I've been looking everywhere for you, and you're out here in the bloody sun looking at -- "

Bellatrix, now standing at Andromeda's side, paused and followed the line of her sister's gaze. Andromeda was wearing a curious expression, one that Bellatrix initially found difficult to analyze. There was pity, yes, and perhaps a touch of shock, as if Andromeda had never seen a dying animal before, but mostly, there was a sense of helplessness. Bellatrix wanted to slap her.

"My dear sister," she began, wiping the sweat away from her eyes, "would you please explain to me how a dead bird caused you to forget that you were supposed to meet me outside my room at three o'clock?"

"I -- " Andromeda's voice was hoarse, so she cleared her throat. "I just got here. Sorry, I had fallen asleep in the kitchen earlier."

"Oh, don't lie to me. Look at yourself: your hair is an absolute mess, and you're all sweaty. I can tell you more than 'just got here.' "

"The bird -- it isn't dead yet, Bellatrix. It's still very much alive. Narcissa found it first, but she left it here and I wanted to see it."

Bellatrix eyed the mess of feathers and screeching and laughed. "Oh, you're weren't feeling _sympathetic_ to the poor thing, were you?"

"I don't know what to do," Andromeda said. " I should get help, I think, but I don't know where to find it."

"Well, if you'll allow me…" Bellatrix stepped between her sister and the bird, even as Andromeda threw out an arm and made a strangled noise of dissent. Bellatrix rolled her eyes and reached into her pocket. Pulling out a knife, she flicked the blade open. "Magic, you see, would be far more efficient, but as it is, Mother would snap my wand in two if I broke the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery again. Unfortunately, there is only so much influence that she and Father have at the Ministry -- I'm not sure if they could get me out of trouble this time. But this -- " She held the blade before her eyes, where it caught the sunlight " -- this will also do."

She heard Andromeda step forward, but she could tell that it was a very tentative step. "What -- what are you doing?"

"I'm helping -- putting it out of its misery."

A breathlessness seized Bellatrix as she placed her hand on the bird's body, feeling its little bones crack beneath her weight. Its squawking intensified as she lowered the knife to a point below its neck. She pressed -- just gently, very gently, then pulled the blade downward, smiling as the bird's torso opened like a flower and the careful arrangement of organs came into view.

"Why, Andy, look at what I've done! I've cut it open, but it's still alive. Now, how is that possible?"

"Bellatrix, stop it!" Andromeda buried her face in her hands. "You're an awful person -- just stop it!"

"Don't fret, my dear." With an almost careless flick of the wrist, she severed the arteries and veins throbbing above the heart, and the bird fell still. "That was very easy, wasn't it?"

"It was _alive_," Andromeda whispered as she lowered her shaking hands.

"It was going to die, Andy. You knew it was going to die. You think these pathetic Muggles out here would have saved your precious bird?"

"You killed it, Bellatrix! Of course it would die after that, but you -- why didn't you just break its neck? It would have been fast -- and it would probably have hurt less."

"Possibly, but it wouldn't have been nearly as fun."

" 'Fun'?" She repeated the word with disbelief. "This -- this is what you and your Slytherin friends do in Diagon Alley, isn't it?"

Bellatrix stared at Andromeda for a moment, momentarily enraged that she would dare mention those rendezvous, but then she relaxed. "Sometimes, yes."

"And -- and what do you do when you're not torturing and killing and…"

"We talk. We're friends, after all."

Bellatrix watches as Andromeda collects herself: the subtle shake of the head, the shifting of weight from foot to foot. "What do you talk about it?"

"Nothing you would understand, Andy."

"I'm fourteen now, Bellatrix."

"And I'm sixteen."

Andromeda pauses. "You wouldn't have killed that bird in front of Narcissa, would you?"

"Oh, yes, I would, but Narcissa isn't stupid. She doesn't like killing and blood either, you know. It would soil her clothes or some nonsense, so the moment I pulled this out in front of her -- " She holds up her knife reverently " -- she would have walked away and forgotten that this bird had ever existed. But you stayed."

"I felt like I had to stay. I mean, I had stayed with for this long already -- "

"Well," Bellatrix interrupted, wiping the blood from her knife with her dress, "you always have a choice, don't you?"


End file.
